Culturally relevant assessment: Kaupapa Māori assessment in early childhood education

Abstract

This chant according to Maori tradition is part of the dedication used at the birth of Maui-tikitiki-a-Taranga, the demigod, ancestor superhero of the Pacific. It was also sometimes used to welcome visitors on to marae, linking the visitors with the spiritual world and powers of the Maori gods, Tūmatauenga, Rongomatane and Tane Mahuta and to Hawaiki, the spiritual Maori homeland. It also provides a model of the universe that dates back thousands of years (Shirres, 1997); a model made up of two intimately connected worlds: the spiritual and the material. These worlds are closely linked with activities in the everyday material world coming under the influence of and interpenetrated by spiritual powers (Reilly, 2004a; Shirres, 1997). Consequently people are connected with the universe, with the world of spiritual powers, the world of the gods.